Pandora's Box
by SilverChrysanth
Summary: This is what my imagination conjured up for an explanation to Pandora's Box in Season 3 and its purpose. Spoilers, but this is mostly my idea. Characters might be a bit OOC. One-Shot.


_I've been wanting to write this down for a long time, and I thought I'd post it. I imagined that this was at somewhere along the lines of the purpose of Pandora's Box, of course until the truth was that Pan was Rumple's dad... I was far off, but I still had fun writing it. Hopefully it isn't just one huge info-dump._

 _Fun Fact: Pandora's Box was actually Pandora's Jar, but in the translation from Greek to Latin the word was translated into pyxis (meaning box), instead of Pithos (meaning Jar). It was never really corrected, so box remained._

* * *

Neal opened the box, and a moment later Rumplestiltskin stood in front of him.

"Thank you, Bae," Rumple half-smiled at his son.

But before anyone could say anything, the box suddenly shook again, and a silvery mist flowed out and onto the ground. Everyone stepped back, surprised.

The mist swirled for a few seconds, before rising and forming into a girl. She was thin and as tall as Regina, with short black hair and icy blue eyes.

No one said anything, until Tink spoke up.

"Well, who is this?"

The girl ignored the fairy, and instead looked at Neal and then the box.

"Pandora's Box," she frowned. "Why dost thou have it?"

Neal turned it over in his hands. "I didn't know anyone else was in here."

"Neither did I," Rumple muttered.

"Who are you?" Emma tried, but the girl was now staring at the Dark One.

"I am Alaina," the girl said with a heavy accent, "And _thou_ art the Dark One," she pointed at him. "The very reason mine sister is dead."

Before anyone could react, a dome of white magic exploded from her, throwing everyone back. Rumple was slammed against a tree, and Alaina appeared in front of him and help him up by his neck. "Thou shall pay for thy deeds."

"I don't know who you are, but I'm not that easy to kill," Rumple scowled, throwing her back onto the ground with dark magic and landing on his feet. A flame appeared in his hand and he threw it at her, but Alaina summoned a blue transparent shield on her arm and deflected it just as the fire hit her. A sword of the same energy then appeared in her hand and she lunged at Rumple, tip pointed at his heart.

"Enough of this," Regina said, breaking the stunned silence of everyone else as she waved her hand, a magical barrier appearing around the girl. She had too much momentum from her jump and slammed into the wall, bouncing back onto the ground, but she leapt up and tried to shatter it, and then stood glaring at Rumple when she couldn't.

"What's going on? Do you know her?" Snow asked Rumple.

"I can't say that I do. I've never seen her before," he answered. "I think I would have remembered her from the Enchanted Forest."

"How about we just try and talk peacefully?" she suggested.

"But isn't that box supposed to hold evil?" Emma scrunched her eyebrows together. "That was the legend, anyway."

"Look," David spoke up, turning to Alaina. "Why don't you explain why you were in the box? I'm sure this is all just a misunderstanding."

Alaina looked at everyone, and then sighed. "'Tis probably for the best." Her weapon and shield vanished, and she sat down cross-legged.

"I was imprisoned in that box by mine brother. I know not if his name is known to thee. I can only imagine what Pan hath done in all the time I have been… Away."

Everyone gasped.

"Pan!?" Neal and Emma exclaimed in unison.

Alaina frowned. "Thou dost know of him, then?"

"How long were you in that box?" Snow asked.

The girl thought a moment, and she suddenly looked tired. "I know not. I shall only assume t'was a long, long time."

"But how do you know me, then?" Rumple asked.

Alaina looked back at him, and her glare returned. "Under normal circumstances I would mistrust those who travel with the Dark One, but in this current… Situation, I shall make an exception. I will tell thee mine story from the beginning." She took a deep breath.

"As I sit here, I now know that I have not aged in that horrid box. Without mine magic, I would believe I was in there only a few days." She sighed, but then continued.

"Long, long ago, I lived on a small island with Pan, and mine sister, Landor. Our parents…" She hesitated, scrunching up her eyebrows. "They… Did not wish for us to remain with them. So we left them and used what little money we had to secure passage to the island. Pan was younger than I but older than Landor, so we both took care of her. She was very young when we left."

"We worked where we could, but even with our combined efforts, we could not afford proper sleeping conditions if we wanted to eat. It was very difficult. Mine sister became frightened very often, and she missed her mother." Her voice became bitter. "A mother who should not have carried three children. At least she was not as harsh as my father…" Alaina paused, shaking her head to change the subject.

"One day, mine brother and I were working together for an old man, doing small things around his house. It was not much, but he gave us three items, telling us he was too poor to pay us with currency. He gave us a dagger, a scroll, and a blue, clear bean. We were not certain what to make of them, so we surmised that we could sell them for food. So we thanked him and left. It was late, so we returned to Landor."

Alaina paused again, and looked at the magic barrier.

"Please, can thou remove thy barrier? 'Tis cramped in here," the girl said, chuckling nervously.

"I'm not sure that's the best idea. We still don't know why you tried to kill the Dark One," Regina said.

Alaina looked as if she wanted to argue, but instead bit her lip. "I am near the end, so I shall wait."

"My sister was intrigued when we returned. The scroll, she was indifferent to. It appeared to be filled with nonsense. We could not even read the word. The dagger she dismissed as being only for basic defense. But the bean," Alaina paused for the third time, a smile appearing on her face.

"She was fascinated. She started to play pretend, imagining herself to be some sort of pirate searching for treasure. Ridiculous, but she was still young."

"Smart girl, this Landor," Hook mumbled.

Alaina glanced at him, raising one eyebrow, but saying nothing. She turned back to Rumple and Regina.

"After long, I grew weary of her game. I told her to cease her pretending and sleep, but she did not want to. I still remember her words: 'I am a pirate, and I do not have to listen to thee.' I could have, and should have handled it differently, but I… I yelled at her. I frightened her, and she threw the bean on the ground, crying that she wished she were on another island, one where she would not have to grow old and do not have to stop playing."

"And it opened up a portal?" Snow guessed.

Alaina nodded, not surprised. "Yes. It drew all of us in, and fortunately some of our belongings that happened to be near us, however few." She looked around. "'Tis this same Island. I can _feel_ thy heart," she whispered. And then she looked back at Regina.

"I know not how long we were here, but we stopped aging." Alaina smiled. "T'was the happiest we had been in a long time. There was an abundance of food, and we knew how to harvest and plant from the work we had done. There was no one to order us, or to make laws or rules; we thought we had finally found a home. But fortune hast never favored me, nor mine siblings. At least, not entirely."

"Somehow, I deciphered the scroll. I had time. It was an old magic scroll, and I learned many spells from it," white magic twirled around her fingers. "T'was very helpful, but mine sister… She took hold of the dagger one day – more pretending, but suddenly, she must have imagined being slain by it, foolishly holding the tip of it to her heart, and then she… She changed," Alaina stuttered, her eyes clouding over. "I know not what happened, or how she triggered it, but she gained magic." She then looked at Rumple, her icy blue eyes piercing into his.

"Dark magic."

"She didn't, well, umm, kill anyone?" Emma asked.

Alaina shook her head. "No, it just _happened._ We knew not it was bad. We believed that it was just another useful power we could use. We were so foolish. But she taught me a few spells," the white magic, momentarily forgotten and idle, turned pure black, spinning quickly and violently around her fingertips, its cold air emanating beyond the barrier.

Regina sensed that if she had wanted to get out of the barrier, Alaina would have. But she didn't say a word.

"T'was small, but helpful in the beginning," Alaina continued. "But as time passed, she taught me more and more about magic that would harm living beings. Neither of us believed we would ever use it; it was just something she told me we should know. I was happy here. I believe mine siblings were too." She stopped, hanging her head as her eyes once again clouded over.

"Then something happened," Snow guessed.

"Yes," Alaina whispered. "A man came to our island. I know not how, even now. But he spoke of different means of world travel. T'was overwhelming how much he told us. If I could have known… He lied about who he was. We gave him food and built for him by magic a small hut he could use. We were too open and careless with our magic. Mine sister left her dagger in her own hut and…" She stopped, covering her face with her hands. Her voice came out muffled and broken.

"He stole it in the middle of the night, and using it, h-he drove it through her heart. As I held her, dying in mine arms, she told me it called to him, just as it had her." Tears began to slip out from behind her hands.

"He t-took her magic, and w-with it, he almost killed Pan and I. I could not let that happen. Anger and sorrow overtook me and…" She removed her hands and stared at them, as if the deed was new and the blood was fresh.

"I attempted to r-remove his heart at that moment, a trick I had learned from Landor, but he left and used some sort of mirror to travel to another world. We could not follow him. I must have cried for a week." She stopped, and took another deep breath.

"That's awful," David said, and everyone murmured an agreement.

"But why did Pan trap you in that box?" Hook asked, earning an elbow to the ribs by Emma.

"'Tis alright," Alaina said, composing herself. "'Tis a valid question. We stayed here, of course. But this home of ours became sad and miserable. We grew to be the same. I taught Pan magic, something he had rejected for a long time but after Landor… He wanted to know, he wanted to protect me, and I him. We became more bitter and bitter until one day, he… He finally lost his inner battle. He turned on me, his own sister, and conjured that," she motioned to the box still in Neal's hand. "He conjured it and he trapped me inside. As a twisted joke, he named it Pandora's Box, after all of us. He went insane, just as I should have. But, I suppose, as the eldest, I still had that sense of protecting him. Even after all this time."

Everyone sat in stunned silence. After a few minutes, Regina waved her hand, removing the barrier.

"I am not that same Dark One," Rumple said.

Alaina sighed. "I realize that now. I apologize for my behavior. I may not have known the passage of time, but being alone in that box was… Awful."

"I know the feeling," Rumple agreed.

"So what do we do now?" Emma asked, looking around.

"We need to stop Pan," Rumple answered.

"What about you?" David asked Alaina.

She looked around at all of them. "We need to stop Pan," she muttered. "We need to stop mine brother."

* * *

 _Definitely different. If Pan had created the box, naming it after himself would have been a bit cliche, but whatever._


End file.
